Steady
by Parabola Beam
Summary: Years have passed since Ruby and her sulky camp counselor Cinder were last in touch. Will the feelings that have built up over time have a chance to be known before it's too late? [Girl Scouts!AU, cross-posted from my tumblr. 18y/o Ruby and 25y/o Cinder]


"The movie's over. Isn't it past your bedtime?"

From where I was nestling against her on the couch, I pouted up at her. I'd never been this cheeky as a child, but being the baby of the family-an eighteen year-old baby-made me all the more defensive of insinuations that I was still a kid.

"They won't know if you don't _tell_." I snuggled closer to her, squeezing my arms around hers and clutching it to my chest. I knew my heart was racing, and I wanted her to feel it. I wanted her to somehow understand what I wasn't brave enough to tell her just yet. "And I'm big now! I don't need a bedtime."

The corner of her mouth quirked upwards and she curled her fingers beneath my pajama top, brushing her knuckles against my hip as she straightened out the thin cotton. The bead of tension that had developed in that short moment evaporated almost as quickly as it came, and I swallowed hard.

I couldn't stop looking at her. I didn't think anyone could look so gorgeous in just pajamas, but her short, black silk robe suited her just right: she looked as sophisticated and put-together as ever, from the gleam in her amber eyes right down to her arched feet.

"Then does that mean you don't need a babysitter anymore?"

"No!" I squeeze closer to her. I know she's joking, but my heart slams at the thought of it just the same. It'd already been years since I'd gotten to see her again, and the more time I spent with her, the less I wanted us to be apart.

"Don't say that! How could you, after I told you how much I like you-"

I retracted my bottom lip and lowered my eyes from hers. Her arm slides around my waist and I look up again, begging silently for her to touch me more, to feel how much I've grown, for her beautiful eyes to drag down my neck and down the front of my tank top, to realize how much I've developed, to see me as a woman, as someone she desires.

I want her to imagine herself touching me the way I have.

To be even more honest, I want more than the imagining.

She brushes her nose against mine, chaste, instead.

"Sometimes I look at you and it feels like you haven't aged a day." They are the words I least want to hear, and I feel my heart sinking in my chest. "But…other times I'm not so sure."

"I'm not little anymore." I answer immediately, nuzzling against her arm. "You're just-soft, and I like having you here, and-" My chest lifts with a breath in as she caresses the back of my neck, fingers curling around to brush my hair off my jaw, and I don't let go, holding myself as close as possible to her as long as I can. Can't she see? I want her to look into my eyes like this and see how they're swimming, how dizzy I am around her, how badly I need a kiss-

I don't want to exhale if it'll take me one more inch away from her.

"Ruby. You're turning blue."

I smile crookedly and try to pretend I'm not about to pass out, but I realize she's probably right and that I should take regular breaths.

"-What about a good night kiss?" It comes blurting out really fast, all at once, and before I have the courage to treat it as an honest request, I start to giggle nervously like I hadn't been serious.

"I wouldn't mind." My breath caught in my throat as she brushed her nose against mine, her damask, dark hair's scent pooling over my shoulder and neck with her proximity. "But-I don't suppose a big girl like you needs a good night kiss to be good and go to sleep, does she?"

She reclined against the arm of the couch and I followed, leaning over, against her.

We were both smiling.

"Maybe-" I began tentatively, "-maybe she needs a grown-up's kiss-" I saw her lips part, and my voice felt heavier with every word, "-in…stead…?"

Her fingers press gently on my lips, almost as much a boon as her lips itself.

"I don't suppose you'd take 'no' for an answer, would you?"

"I _would_, though-" I murmur against her fingertips as I take her hand and kiss the pulse inside her wrist; I know she's teasing me, but I still feel the need to reassure her. "-I'm not…not going to be a child with you. I don't want to be. There are things I do want-" My knees slide around her hips and I slide my fingers into the silk of her robe that's slipping around her shoulders, helping it away from what I want to see-

"-but you simply tolerating me isn't one of them-"

"No."

"Cinder-" I plead as I give pause, not to continue, but to know I haven't wronged her, and a weary smile passes her lips, as though she's been struggling with something of her own that she's lost to.

"No, you're not going to be a child to me." Her fingers fan out under my throat and push up on my chin, leaving space for her lips to press flush and hot on my throat, slow and warm, and I feel my hips all but melting open, the scent of arousal hanging heavy and sweet between us like smoke. "Not after this, certainly not…" I could listen to her for days, the way her voice threads words together, husky and warm. I close my eyes as her lips drag down my neck and she mumbles more words against it, sweet nothings.

"As long as you _want_ to grow up this fast-"

"I'm sure, I'm sure-" I'm panting, and she bites softly on the nape of my neck with a purr, her fingers fanning around the crest of my hips and easing me closer.

I want to touch her more, too.

I breathe in sharply and mentally count to three before putting my hands at her waist and pulling the satiny sash from the waist of her robe, letting it splay open.

Her underwear is black and lace, and she isn't wearing a bra.

She's looking at me much, much differently suddenly: there's an intrigued twinkle in her eyes and the way her bottom lip is tucked neatly under her teeth makes a lump in my throat and something hot coil up in my stomach. Her hands are tugging at my pajama bottoms so I ease forward to let her take them, and I wrap my arms around her waist to kiss at her breasts and breathe in the scent of her skin; like spiced vanilla and sandalwood, so sweet and _good-_

-and the cigarette smoke trapped in her soft, downy hair, sable and thick, is just wrong enough to make her feel even better.

"_Shit_, Ruby-" She hisses, and her hands slide into the space behind my knees and tug me closer. It's quickly becoming obvious that this couch is much too small for us, for what we're doing, but neither of us want to stop long enough to move, especially not after having had to stop so quickly the first time, being almost caught by dad and Yang.

I'd told her how I'd felt, then, last weekend when we were alone again. I'd worn my girl scouts uniform for her and worn my heart on the sleeve of it, and told her how I'd never really stopped thinking about my sullenly sweet counselor after all those years.

A lot had changed with time, but she was still too special to me to say.

No one is going to stop us tonight. No one is going to come between everything that is about to happen right here and now-

"-_shaking_-" Cinder points out to me and the next thing I feel is her fingers catching in my hair, steadying me so her lips can find purchase against mine, starting something slower and deeper than anything we've had before.

"Mmnh…"

"Scared…?"

Her voice is making the heat between my legs spread, slick, against the center of my underwear, against the knee she slides in place there. It feels realer and more dreamlike at once with every moment, and I can't stop kissing her. I can't keep my mouth off of her. I just shake my head and it becomes a nuzzle against her pulse that goes lower and lower, deeper and deeper into her chest, her soft tummy, until my tongue laves against her clothed center with possession bordering on obsession-she breathes in sharp and tilts her head back and I see the line of her body arching from her navel straight to her chin-I did that, I'm doing that, doing this to her-

"…Are you?" My voice comes out gravelly and loaded with intent-I don't know what's come over me, the thoughts in my head. That she's mine, that I want to kiss her and taste her and hold her to me as long as I draw breath, I want her so much-

"More than ever before in my life." Her voice comes dryly, but I know how she sounds when she's trying to sound unaffected.

And I can tell that she's definitely affected by what I'm doing.

We hear the car pulling up in the driveway and we pull away from each other-I could cry, I can't believe this is happening again-and begin to frantically pull our clothes back on. Cinder swears under her breath and she's flustered enough to blush-none of this is fair, I just want to look at her and stay with her and now she's going to end up going home-

I bite my lip and turn to her.

"Stay with me tonight," I whisper frantically as the key turns in the lock, as the voices of Yang and dad draw nearer, "I'll find a way, okay?"

"Ruby-"

"I love you, stay with me."

My chest feels about ready to explode by the time they come in, and instead of looking her in the eyes I go to give Yang a hug; she and dad are chilly from the outside and her hair is slightly damp.

"Hey you guys! What happened? I thought you were flying back to Patch to-you know-"

_Visit mom_.

"You're kidding, Rubes. Have either of you even looked outside this whole time? It's snowing like crazy! They shut down air travel because of the blizzard and we barely made it back in one piece with all the black ice on the roads-" Yang tossed her head and shook the remaining snow from her hair, and their father sighed and adjusted his jacket, about to say something, but I seized the opportunity before he could tangent into a long-winded lecture.

"We should let Cinder stay the night then. She can stay in my room, I don't mind." It was difficult to stay casual when I was still bursting with feeling, my heart pounding with the hopes of being alone with her again.

"Great idea, sweetheart. It wouldn't do to have Miss Fall turning into Miss _Winter _out there."

"Ha! Nice one!"

I groaned as he and Yang high-fived. Cinder cleared her throat.

"Thank you very much for offering to have me. But…are you quite sure I shouldn't be going?"

"Absolutely!" Dad took off his coat and as he hung it up on the rack by the door, Cinder said nothing. I met her gaze and her eyebrows flickered subtly at me.

The question had been meant for me.

"Of course," I said slowly, never looking away, "I wouldn't dream of letting you go now."

Cinder's lips curled into a reassured grin, her chest rising and falling with a sigh that was a little deeper than usual.

It excited me beyond description. When I saw the keyhole of skin at her chest, the memories we'd begun to make just minutes ago seemed to itch under my skin for her touch.

"Where's she gonna stay?" Yang asked as she hung up her coat. "She'll freeze on the couch and my room's too messy. Ruby, give her your bed."

Dad was surprised when I didn't argue, but Yang sure wasn't.

…

Ruby was waiting in her bedroom, which I'd prolonged invading the sanctity of by excusing myself to take a shower.

There was a lot to consider.

Ruby trusted me. I was her counselor, and I'd been a mentor to her, someone partitioned strictly out of bounds by the standards that the job entailed.

Then again, someone becoming a camp counselor as an alternative to hard time in juvie probably wasn't a shining example of virtue to begin with. It wasn't exactly a secret to Ruby or her family that I was a little rough around the edges, so to speak, and yet-

They trust me. They treat me as one of their own, and Ruby sees me as even more than that. Much, much more.

I borrow shampoo and conditioner from the rack in the shower without paying attention and work it through my hair. The whiff of roses that follows indicates to me just a moment too late whose it was. I groan aloud. Of course.

I can't afford to mess her up. I can't lose the trust that brought her to me, when she was so small and alone, when everyone else had quickly paired off with their counselors upon coming to camp, when she'd found the bench I'd been sulking at and sat beside me and made me start to think that maybe all kids _weren't_ little shitlord terrorists.

I can't be selfish, but the _entire reason _I'm in the middle of this existential crisis is because when I was fifteen I felt like paying for cigarettes was beneath me.

I'm not like Ruby.

I shake my head and let the conditioner rinse out as I go for the body wash, anything to prolong my decision, and lather it over my neck and chest. Soap suds slide in lazy trails down my waist and I watch as one curls into my navel before snapping out of my reverie. I can't afford to re-imagine her soft, curious lips on my skin, the things they were doing-

My hand wanders too low and I yank it back. I close my eyes and exhale with irritation.

Fuck.

Ruby _knows _I'm not like her. It's been years, she's smarter than I can probably imagine. I should give her more credit, but-

That would mean giving her opinion of me more credence than my own.

I scrub vigorously before remembering that this is just my body, not my conscience.

I would love to say that I'm wrong, if it didn't mean I'd be saying the same about Ruby. There's not a wrong bone in her body.

A voice inside me nags that this is a matter of the heart, and that of course her feelings may be swayed by idolizing me in the past. She's an adult, but the innocence is still there, and she might do something she_ regrets_-

I don't want to be a regret to her. I don't want her to look at herself-or look at me-with frightened eyes as she remembers the things we did and to want nothing more to do with me.

I want to protect her, I'm too scared it's too late to do that, and I'm too selfish to leave her alone. I'm too greedy to think of her finding someone her own age and looking at them the way that she looks at me.

I'm a wreck. Always was.

And Ruby said that she loved me. I didn't even know where to start with that one.

I dialed the shower water down and toweled off, saving my hair for last. I almost made it out the bathroom door before just about having a mini heart-attack when I realized I hadn't pulled my robe back on.

I'm used to walking around in the buff at my own place. A scowl crosses my lips as I pull my arms through the sleeves. I'm too comfortable here, and that's dangerous.

When I make it to her room, relatively clothed and relatively damp, I hear a frantic shuffling as I open the door.

I can't do this.

Ruby's cheeks are bright red, and she's sheepishly pulling her hands from under the blanket and pretending she'd been pulling the covers up to her chin.

I can smell it.

I know exactly what she's been doing, and from how she's looking at me, I know exactly who she's been thinking of too.

"There you are," She pants, breathlessly, "I missed you-"

"Hush."

Every bit of it was gone. It was broken, imagined, forgotten, destroyed. It was only this and now, her and _her_.

Until now, I'd never had to choose between having what I wanted and controlling myself. The latter was the means to the former and I hadn't dreamed that they'd ever overlap in a manner where part of what I wanted meant not having it-

But I wanted it more than I wanted to not want it, so now I'm looming over her in the bed, stalking closer, losing control, I'm kissing her neck-

I'm barely conscious of the fact that her blanket is the last barrier between this and what we both want to happen, less so that some shred of decency in me is keeping it there on purpose until I can manage to get the words out.

The right ones never come. Only the wrong, the wronger, and the wrongest, and she replies in kind each time as I kiss her senseless. So, so easy, dangerously so.

"You said you loved me."

"I do."

Between saying that much and the next time we speak, I'm under the blanket with her, vows broken already. Her pearly little fingers curl into my hair as my tongue presses against hers, as my hands slide under her tank top and stretch it up over her breasts. Mine press against her stomach when I shift down to press my lips to each soft, rosen peak in turn, edging my teeth over them and feeling her rib cage expand in my hands when she gasps.

"No more-" I mutter quietly against her navel, "-no more of those eyes you were giving me in the living room," I feel her pulse jump when I press my lips to her skin, "and no more begging, unless it's loud and clear and I can know that you know how _bad I am for you_-"

Something brittle breaks apart in my throat and I stop dead in my tracks, blinking furiously.

"S-Stop-" Ruby murmurs, rolling us over, resting her head over my heartbeat. My breath sticks and catches hard from how close my tears had come to her skin, "-I'm stupid, I'm so stupid, I should have noticed this was_ hurting _you-"

I hold her and my fingers bury into her hair, mouthing 'no, no, _no_-' aloud as firmly as I can.

I don't know whether I'm more defiant of the idea of her berating herself on my account for…_this_, or just dumbfounded that she was right about me.

"-I just, got selfish, I dunno, Cinder, I just don't get it and I've tried really hard to think about it but every time I do I just start thinking of your smile or the time when you stayed in the hospital overnight with me when Weiss accidentally-on-purpose gave me those poison berries during my field test-" A weak laugh rasped through her chest, through mine, and the fragility of it only made me hold her closer, "-I know what you're worried about-I'm worried too even though I've talked to Yang and like-she's cool with it, with us-I mean, only if I could tell you-I guess I kinda am now-but I guess it's just because we're different-a lot's happened since mom-since she…But meeting you, was-it was too special and I didn't want to lose you and then I didn't get to see you for so long it wasn't fair it _wasn't fair _I kept thinking about where you were and then you were _here _and, please believe me-" She hiccuped, "-I never wanted you to get hurt because of how I feel, I'm just more selfish than I can help when it comes to being with you and I want _everything _with you-"

I can barely believe it, but somehow I manage.

"I'm the same way." I confess into the dark of her hair. Ruby nuzzles blindly into my embrace. The intimacy of her skin against mine, the way her clothes are spread off-kilter on her body and of the way her breath travels through the folds of the satin robe dipping off my shoulders and hips is almost suffocating. I drag my fingers down her back and make her shiver for the warmth we're offering one another. "God, if only you knew."

She looks up at me without hesitation, a watery smile pulling her lips.

"Show me." She shakes me lightly in a manner that prefaces desperation. She repeats herself, more quietly this time, and a shiver goes through my chest that doesn't quite make it all the way up to my skin, staying just inside and vibrating beneath my bones with a hum of encouragement as our lips near once more.

The space between our lips slowly ceases to be, the boundaries smeared into an ether of informed ambiguity, a heaven of tryst and solace.

We know enough, now.

I won't hurt her if I don't waver. That's all there is to it.

I'd give her better if I could, but as long as Ruby wants me, I can justify anything I do to her, and anything she does to me.

"We can keep kissing, right…? I want to-" Her breath feathers over my chin as she slackens against me, overwhelmed, "-keep going-" She squeals as I roll her onto her side and press flush against her from behind, dragging sloppy, imprecise kisses back from her jaw and along her hairline.

"As long as you want."

"Then-Then let me-" She tries to edge her chin back over her shoulder towards mine, hungry for kisses, but it only serves to let me see the way her lips part when I slide my fingers through hers and drag them against her waist, down between her thighs.

"You were _touching_ yourself-" Even in the dark, I can tell she's blushing just from how hot her cheeks get. I press a kiss to one and then to the back of her neck. "-I want to know what you were thinking about."

Ruby squeals and squeezes her legs together, drawing my touch deeper.

"No no no, you're gonna call me a pervert-"

Her breath hitches as I matter-of-factly drag our fingers up together, spreading her labia, feeling slick seeping out to reward my efforts. She's sensitive, and primed from the little foray into experimentation from while I was still in the shower-

_Ah_.

"You wanted to take a shower with me, didn't you?" My hand eases off of hers to tug her pajama pants down over the swell of her ass, and her fingers don't stop moving, proving my belated realization correct. The elastic of her underwear is stretched around her wrist where it's angled against her, and I hook my thumbs into the band at either side and roll her onto her back, watching as her free hand fists into the pillow behind her, how her breasts heave, half-caught in the tight tank top, how her rosy, soft nipples are peeking out beneath the edge of it.

I want to spoil her absolutely _rotten_.

By now the blanket is an inconvenient sweat trap, so I shrug it aside, watching as she lays there moaning, eyes glazed. When I tug her panties down, a viscous strand clings between them and her body. She shakes beneath me and her hips jerk as I slide my fingers flush against her, closing the grip from my other hand around her wrist and pushing it up to join her other.

"My turn," I whisper against her cheek, before turning in and closing my teeth on it gently with a tug and a breathless laugh, "my lovely girl, beautiful, sweet thing-"

I sink a finger inside partway and she quivers around me, eyes rolling back in her head with a gasp.

"-It's time I treated you like the ripe young woman you've flowered into, isn't it?"

She nods dumbly and bites her lip as I ease inside all the way past my knuckle and stroke her back and forth, slow and with emphasis on each moment my finger is at its deepest in her, twisting, curling, beckoning-

I slide it out and take a brief lick before probing the finger at her lips, watching as she presses her tongue out to lap it up.

"I want you to know how sweet you are-" I croon, leaning up and stroking a stray lock of auburn off her cheek with my other hand, caressing it away behind her ear reverently, "-before I have all the rest."

She whines sweetly and wraps her arms around my shoulders, and we indulge each other in a way that would've made the younger me positively sick: touching foreheads, bumping noses, soft, reassuring lips, but when we touch, a heavy buoyancy fills my ribs and presses harder and harder.

"Do you know how perfect you are…?" I only break the kiss to press more to her hair, her skin, her lashes, countless times. She blinks innocently as I take her hand and caress the back of her fingers, trail long, slow kisses from the inside of her wrist down before sliding my touch to cradle her face in my hands. "Do you know what I'd do for you, what I'd do to keep you-" My fingers splay over her collarbone, the peaks of her breasts, cherish the curves of her waist, and smooth themselves beneath her hips to expose her deepest place, her thighs melting open without any resistance, ready and wanting-

"-Just like this?"

Before she can answer me, my lips press reassuringly below her navel before kissing down with a sharp breath in, treating her to a long and languid, lingering stroke, parting her lips and finding my way inside, only as slow as she could bear. Her body moves, jagged, like lightning, and I'd be inclined to apologize to her if I weren't intent on ravishing her senseless. The wet sound of my tongue inside her feels impossibly loud, and the overlay of her squealing and sighing my name makes me feverishly wonder how thin the walls are.

"C-Cinder, oh, oh my _god_-" Ruby whispers, the words vibrating fearfully from her chest, "-I love you, I love you I love you I love you so _much_-"

The last part is sobbed, and I flutter my tongue over her swollen clit as a reward, trapping it between my lips and giving an experimental suck.

Her hips jerk so suddenly that she knocks into my chin, hard, and I have to pin her down so she doesn't make me bite my tongue off while I'm working her over. The movement refers through her upper body instead and she writhes against her pillow-I glance up to steal a look-her eyelashes are fluttering like butterfly's wings trying to escape a spider's web, her lips trembling-

I wrap my arms more securely around wherever I can reach to pull her closer-her hips, her legs, her thighs-and drag her flush onto my tongue, sliding it deep inside of her and circling her inner walls with a determination, boundless, to match the pleasure I want to bring her-

Tonight is all about her. Tonight, and every single night to follow, she'll receive as much or as little of my love as she wants, gentle or otherwise, fast or slow, as much and as long as she wants it.

I kiss her slowly until she comes, writhing and rolling towards my mouth, and I swallow everything she gives, greedily and lazily at once, exhausted from the aftershocks of thrill running through the both of us.

"Cinder, Cinder come _here_-"

Ruby's shaking, so I go to her, crawl up against her and still her trembling with that of my own, spent and with an unusually pressing need to be holding her, to be held. She fits so perfectly underneath me, we kiss, we touch, we are, here and together and I've _made love _to her-

Her arms wrap around my waist, she touches my back, slides curious hands down the satin of my robe and unties it for the second time this evening, touching aimlessly, seeking my skin for its warmth, not for anything else. I let her, pressing my hands in at the pillow beneath her and sighing as her fingers trail against the peaks of my chest and spread warmth through my gut.

The curtains on the window part just enough to fill her eyes with stars and moonlight.

"I love you, Ruby," I kiss the words into the crown of her head and she echoes them back to me, moving closer into my embrace and hiding her arms inside my robe, hands wandering slightly, "I'll stay as long as you want me to."

She squeezes me and buries her nose in my hair so suddenly that we almost roll off her bed, but we're steady-

And I intend to keep us that way.


End file.
